Benjamin Shalva

We think things that hold us back and dampen our spirit. But it's not just about thinking. Our actions matter. It takes conscious, consistent, and creative effort to make a life worth living. This podcast is about how other people keep themselves moving in the right direction, how they feed their good wolf YEA, thanks for joining us. Our guest on this episode is Benjamin Shalva, who is back on the

podcast for a second interview. Ben is the nationally renowned author of Ambition Addiction, How to Go Slow, Give Thanks, and Discover Joy Within. His previous book was Spiritual Cross Training, Searching Through Silence, Stretch and Song. Ben has been published in The Washington Post, Elephant Journal, and Spirituality and Health magazine. He's a rabbi, writer, meditation teacher, and yoga instructor. Shalva leads spiritual seminars and workshops throughout the world. And here's

the interview with Benjamin Shalva. If you value the content we put out each week, then we need your help. As the show has grown, so have our expenses and time commitment. Go to one you feed dot net slash support and make a monthly donation. Our goal is to get to five percent of our listeners supporting the show. Please be part of the five percent that make a contribution and allow us to keep putting out these interviews and ideas. We really need your help to make the

show sustainable and long lasting. Again, that's one you feed dot net slash Support. Thank you in advance for your help. Hi Benjamin, Welcome to the show. Hey, thanks Eric, it's so great to be back. There's not very many guests who have made a second appearance, so you've joined some

elite company at this point. Um, you've got another book out very quickly, which is why we're having you back, and I'm excited to get into The book talks about ambition addiction, which is a question I asked myself often about whether I fall into that category. In your book helped me sort some things out. So we'll get to that here in a second. But let's start like we always do, with the parable. There's a grandfather who's talking with his grandson and he says, in life, there are

two wolves inside of us that are always at battle. Actually, I'm gonna change it this week. I'm gonna do it with turkeys because it's Thanksgiving. Nice do it? Go with it? All? Right? There's h how does it? I can't remember. There's a grandfather who's talking with his grandson. He says, in life, there are two turkeys inside of us that are always

at battle. One of them is a good turkey, which represents things like love and bravery and peace, and the other is a bad turkey, which represents things like greed and hatred and fear. And the grandson stops and he thinks about it for a second. He looks up at his grandfather and he says, well, which one wins? And the grandfather says, the one you feed. So I'd like to start off by asking you what that silly parable means to you in your life and in your work.

I like it with the turkeys. First of all, well, I'll probably gonna release this in like March. People are gonna be like, what right, right, right, We're over the turkeys now, right, But um, I feel like I've got turkey inside me, so it fits. But but let me say that I'm struggling every day. You know, I'm trying to be a good person. I'm trying to be a good husband and father, and I'm trying to be an

effective writer and teacher. But it's a struggle. And the struggle is somewhat having to do with just sort of being skilled in those different endeavors um and trying to figure out what to do in a given moment, you know, how to proceed. But actually the meat of the struggle is so much about um, my desire to be the best or the greatest, or the most powerful, or the sexiest, or the most adored or the most admired, and that

ego drive for me. It's and every day, every ours, sometimes every minute practice of recognizing that ego and acknowledging it with a nod, but then stepping back and choosing a lighter path, a path of heart, a path of humility, and uh, going with the good turkey. Um, is that struggle every day? I agree with that for sure. The book is called Ambition Addiction, How to Go Slow, Give Thanks, and Discover joy within, and I resonated with a lot of it. And we'll get to that a little bit.

But I was really interested in the topic because as a former addict of drugs and alcohol, I've certainly wondered at points if I haven't taken whether it's ambition or work or you know, what I do to be, is it just become another addiction for me? Um, And and your book helped me think through that, and so I'm looking forward to talking about that. But let's let's start

with what do you mean by ambition addiction? So, Um, I started figuring out this idea of ambition addiction because I noticed in my own life I was having these dreams of all encompassing glory, kind of all or nothing, fantasy of uh, you know, perfect future to come for me.

It took the shape of, you know, I want to be a critically acclaimed, world renowned best selling writer, right, And so I had this dream in my head and I began to see that that a lot of times this dream was getting in the way of my physical health, my relationships, my spiritual well being. And I began to see that, you know, while ambition can be a really wonderful, essential part of being a healthy human being and doing good things in the world, that the ambition can sometimes

cross over the line and become destructive. And that's what I caught talk about. When I say ambition addiction. It's that unrelenting drive to dominate, to win, two be the absolute best, no matter the cost. And it's when that drive also leaves a lot of casualties in its wake, in terms of personally and in terms of relationships, and in terms of spiritual life. One of the things you talk about in the book is this idea of we

live in this fantasy of any day now. What is that? Yeah, So any day now is the name that I've given to that dreams that that dream that we have in our heads of the perfect Hollywood ending. Now, your any day now is going to be different than my any day now, and it's going to be different than someone

else's any day now. But what unites them all is the fact that when we haven't any day now, we have this dream of a perfect ending where there's a tableau you know, and everyone's just in their place, and we've won the final grand prize, you know, and we've dominated, and all the struggle has proven to lead us to this amazing end point. And the thing about in any

day Now is that it's it's a mirage. So one of the difficult issues with ambition addiction is that a lot of us actually think that that mirage is real. You know. Um, we imagine that like, oh, you know, if I actually do get that best selling book and that you know, pulleit serprise that I'll be happy, because that's the picture I have in my head. But in fact it's not real because people with best selling books and Pulitzer prizes are not necessarily any happier than you

or me. And we know that, of course, because they share that fact with us and they say, I'm still me. I'm still a regular person struggling, but are any day now. It leads us to believe that we will reach an end of suffering if we only you know, uh, write that book or get that promotion, or get our kids to Harvard or whatever it is that we're dreaming of. I agree with that. I also think though, that any day now is more pervasive than just an ambition issue.

I think it. I think it crops up in a lot of the self improvement things that we try and do, even if it's not to be the best meditator in the world. But if I meditate, if I just get to the point where I meditate every single day and exercise every single day, um, and read enough books, my any day now will be a day where it's easy and life is easy and it's not a challenge anymore. So I think it's interesting as we talk about this because I see that also beyond just the type of

ambition you're describing in the book. Oh yeah, that's absolutely true. I think that we as human beings, we do tend to fantasy. We do tend to imagine, uh you know, a future that is an improvement on the present. Sometimes that actually could be a healthy thing if it drives us two and motivates us to do good work in

the world. I think that where I sort of specify ambition addiction is um if that any day now of ours, in whatever realm it is, if it starts to consume us so much that we we don't have any bandwidth for things like our physical health, for getting sleep, for eating well, for exercise, or if we're ignoring our kids or our spouse or friends. You know, that's when I think, uh, it becomes something that where we need to recognize that we are suffering from an actual addiction and take the

steps we need to recover. Let's talk about what an ambition addiction is, because you say in the book, and I believe it to be true that some degree of ambition is a good thing. I mean, I look at I feel like built into the very fabric of existence is the desire for growth and creation and and stretching. I feel like that's just you know, to me, there's a lot that's it's a very spiritual thing. So there, you know, we're recognizing, Hey, there's some degree of that

that's good. How do you start to diagnose has this gone too far? With me? Am? I am I an addict? I mean, because it seems like, you know, addiction is just you know, a good thing that is usually just taken way too far right right, and and it can be hard to differentiate. It's I mean, I think when when one starts to ask themselves, you know, is my ambition going too far? It's it's it can be kind

of nebulous figuring that out. So I've identified a number of signs and symptoms that I've seen in my own life, I've seen in other ambition addicts, and I think these are things to look out for. And to name a couple that I think are very prevalent. One is a real contempt for the present and a reverence for the future.

That's a big one. When you find yourself walking around seeing the present moment as just kind of a you know, a d m V waiting room to get through so that you can get to get back on the highway, you know, and you're kind of ignoring all the gifts and in this present moment. That's a that's a key sign. And along with that, another really important um sign to

look for is manic pace. You know, when ambition is driving us to always be fast and furious, always in a rush, impatient with other people, very very busy all the time, you know, running into people in the grocery store and just being like, oh sorry, I'm so sorry, I can't talk right now. I'm just in a rush, you know, and all and finding ourselves doing that over and over again. That's another real sign. And just to talk about one more that I think is very important.

A lot of ambition atticts suffer from a severity and depression. So a lot of us are on this essentially this dopamine roller coaster. You know, Um, every time we picture are any day now, neurons in our brain are transmitting a neurotransmitter called dopamine, and that gives us a real buzz, It gives us a high. But dopamine is connected with often with with hope for the future. So every time that we don't get that any day now, that dopamine level then declines and we end up going into actual

physical withdrawal. And so a lot of times ambition addicts are going to be very uh forlorn, depressed, you know, cranky, moody, and have a hard time enjoying and appreciating even very simple pleasures because you know, they're always gritting their teeth, there, always have a furrowed brow, and they're never really able to lighten up. I identify with some of those things. Is a lot of those things you just said describe Chris, and I can assure you he does not have an

ambition addiction. No, that, no one, no, this episode does not apply to him. We can feel, we can we could feel pretty, we could feel pretty confident in this one but one last thing to worry about. But for me, I recognize some of those things. What I thought was interesting is you listed out some of those symptoms and and I have some degree of those at different points. What I thought you said, and I really like this. You said, all addictive behaviors, from alcoholism to work, all

is um too, ambition, addiction have too common traits. Addictive behaviors are persistent and counterproductive. And and that was a different frame that I started. You know, when I started to look at it through that frame, I started to feel like maybe I was Okay, yeah, well that's exactly what I start the book with is actually a diagnostic process based on that idea that that addictive behavior is

something we do often and it's counterproductive. And what I do is I have the readers go through a diagnostic process, you know, they're kind of filling in worksheets if you will, to really see when I work, when I work out, when I parent, or you know, whatever it is that I'm ambitious about, are my actions both persistent and counterproductive?

And a lot of times, what we're going to find is that sure, my actions are persistent, but they're not necessarily counterproductive, They're not necessarily uh destructive or hurting other people, are hurting, hurting myself. Um, and in that case, you know, that's terrific. That that means that we're ambitious individuals with a healthy ambition within healthy boundaries. And that's something to celebrate. But then again, what I hope the book can help

clarify for folks as well. There are times, however, when my behaviors do become both persistent and counterproductive. And now and those and on those occasions, that's where I really need to be careful. And one of the ways that I help readers think about this too is when you're thinking about your goals, one way to sort of get a sense of would my goal here be counterproductive or not is to think of it. Think of it this way,

is my goal and all or nothing goal? If, for instance, my goal is to become president of the United States, Let's just say, would I be satisfied if I also became a senator or a congressman, or a you know, uh, someone involved in civic affairs in a meaningful way. And if I, in my heart say no, I have to be number one or nothing at all. That's a real clear sign that that goal in that arena in my life is going to be counterproductive because all are nothing.

Goals tend to be goals that require us to sacrifice everything else. We're not feeling too inspired for a clever bit right now about the donation campaign. After we just finished off a large pizza, So I'll killing super fired, super fired up. Yeah, I'm I'm not really willing to ask for money right now, but I'm certainly willing to take a long map. That's right. My job is to

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So when you contribute right now, you are helping bring the show to lots and lots of other people, people who listen to it today and can't afford it. And I get emails from those people who say I wish I could help and they can't. And also to all the people who have never yet heard the show. So you can be part of the show. You can help support it and do something good in the world at the same time by going to one you feed dot net slash support. We really need your help. Thank you.

And here's the rest of the interview with Benjamin Shalva. You have a line that I like where you say the road to hell is not paved with good intentions, the road to hell is paved with unexamined intentions. And I just thought that's sort of summarizes a lot of what we're talking about here very well. In you know, am I looking at what is? You know, what's behind what I'm doing? And and I always believe for myself that most things that I do in life, it's difficult

for me to have an entirely pure motive. I would be lying if I said that I did the show only to you know, put messages of hope into the world, right of course, and to help other people. That's a big part of it. But there are also other parts of you know, ego works its way in or wanting to be successful or or all that stuff. And so I've gotten o ka as as I've grown into saying, you know what, I'm not going to probably you know, be pure as the driven snow on some of these things.

But what I find to be really useful is to is to be able, like you say, to exam am in my intentions and look at which ones are driving and which ones are dominant. Exactly. It's not about uh purging ourselves of ego, um, which would be impossible. It's it's not about uh having pure motives as you said, you know, um, looking honestly at our lives is looking at ourselves warts and all, but then being able to

make good choices with that knowledge. So, you know, example of that would be that, you know, I have a lot of ambition as a writer and teacher, and uh when I write and teach during the day, you know, when my kids are at school. But the other day I got an invitation from my son's teacher to join them on a field trip to Mount Vernon because we live here in the d C area, And so my first initial thought was I can't do it. I'm you know, I've got to work. I've got important writing I've got

important teaching. I've got preparations and things to do. So um, what I did then at that moment was I really step back and you know, and this is the idea of examining my intention. And I asked myself, Uh, am I going to say no to chaperoning my son's field trip because there's essential work that needs to happen and even though that work is connected with ego, that might be okay, or am I doing it because I'm afraid.

I'm afraid that if I do something like, you know, be the dad on the field trip, that I'm gonna lose my edge, lose the ground I've gained as a professional, and you know, be you know, end up you know, uh, suffering in obscurity. And so you know, at that point, I decided, Look, I'm going to go on the field trip and you're going to check your phone the entire time and not pay any teaching, right right? You know. I actually I actually had to work on it as

I was on the field. You know, put the phone away, be present. But that's the work we have to do. And again, it's not about having pure motives. It's about examining our motives and being really real with ourselves and saying, if this is just about ego, if this is just about um, you know, my fears and insecurities, is that really the person I want to be? Is that what where I want to act from my whole life? Or or can I bring in some I guess I would

say more compassionate, hopeful motives. Also, yeah, I think noticing the fear is that's a really good one because I'll notice that in regards to the show, I'll see lots of other podcasts coming out or um, you know, the numbers will stay kind of just you know, we're not really growing, and I'll start to get this little bit of fear, and that's the time for me that it's important to go back to what is the real intention

for why I'm doing this? And it works so well for me to to stop and go, oh, wait a minute, that's not what this is about. You know, I'm doing this for X, Y, and Z reasons, which you know, I'm reaping the benefits of and I've achieved and and all that, and that helps me step out of the fear. So the fear for me is an indicator that I'm letting some of the bad turkey slide in and and

take over more of my motivation. And what's so nice about that is what you just describe was that you use that as an opportunity to refocus and recommit to those essential goals that that led you to create the

show in the first place. And so one of the things that um, I encourage ambition atics to do is not to quit their ambitious and endeavors, or to to not have goals or dreams, but in fact to use this addiction as a motivator to actually become more committed to their goals and objectives, but in a healthier way, you know, because I do think that um, when that fear creeps in, it can actually definitely, you know, be an oppertut tunity for us to commit to what's meaningful.

I agree. So let's talk about the other side of it, which is getting better or recovering from ambition addiction or um, you know, treating it. What are some of the things that you recommend, which, by the way, the things that you're gonna talk about I think are useful. Even if you say, well, I'm maybe I'm not an addict, they still are pretty useful in the context of all of us in the modern human age where everybody sort of looks like one sometimes, right, and certainly our culture is

encouraging right this, you know, this unfettered ambition. Uh, in the midst of that. The road to recovery that I've laid out consists of five steps that have worked for me and that I've seen work for others who have met, you know, along different spiritual paths and in different communities and people I've worked with as a writer and teacher. And the first step, which is the hardest and the

most essential, is slowing down. So again, we ambition addicts see the present moment as prelude and the future as salvation. So naturally we are going to rush because the faster we get to that future, the better, because that Hollywood

endings waiting for us. Slowing down then is a huge change for us, and it involves what I recommend in the book is actually a mindfulness practice that involves uniting our breath with our actions and actually with a mantra that we can maintain um mentally as well, and to that allows us to actually down shift and rediscover the present moment. Because I think what's happening to a lot of us is that we've actually lost touch with the very ground beneath our feet, with the very moment that

we find ourselves in. And it actually is amazing. A few deep, mindful breaths, you know, a little bit of the slowing down work that I recommend, and the mind and body and even the soul really shift and and there's a there's a huge change, and that can pave the way to the other steps that come after it. The start is definitely going slow and the slow down

you use three words breath word indeed. Can you walk just real quickly through how to apply those absolutely and breath word indeed is a technique that can be practiced anywhere, any time. So any time you find yourself going fast and losing your breath and not having any time, this is a great practice. Here's what you do. Essentially, the first thing you do is to just notice your breath, breathing in and out. The next thing you do is you start to connect your breathing with your action and

with a narration in your head. So let's say that you're driving your car, so as you inhale, you would say to yourself, I am making a right turn. As you exhale, you'd say to yourself, this is all just thinking in your head. I am making a right turn. On your next inhale, you'd say I'm straight not straightening straightening out the car. On your excel, you'd say, I'm

stopping at a stop sign, and on and on. So you can do this with any activity, you know, if you're you can do this while you're lifting weights, or you can do this, you know, while having coffee with a friend, whatever it is, um. And what this does is because you're narrating what you're doing in your head. You've got this like kind of golf style announcer saying, you know, and now he's making a right turn, and

now he's you know. And as that as that narrator is narrating what's happening in your head, and as you're connecting it with your breath, and each time you breathe,

you're you're you're reciting what you're doing. What ends up happening is you can't help but slow down because you're not giving your brain room to be able to think, Uh, gotta get home so I can so I can write that next thing, so I can win that award, so that I can get that promotion, so that you know, the brain has already been narrating other things and they

all have to do with ambition. And once we do this breath word, indeed, the brain suddenly gets consumed with I am making a right turn, I am tying my shoes or whatever it is, and it slows us down. And what's so key about that too, is that once you've practiced breath word indeed and you start slowing yourself down, it actually gives your body time to absorb a lot of the adrenaline and cortisol and other stress hormones that have probably been flowing through your body up until this point.

Because a lot of us, when we're moving this fast, we're in constant didn't fight or flight constantly, you know, essentially in a high stress situation physically. And when we slow down, our nervous system gets the Q and says, okay, hey, uh, you know, endocrine system time to reabsorb these stress hormones and we can we can, we can down shift from

Defcon five here, you know, we're okay. And what's amazing about that then is that, uh, once our body starts to downshift, it gives us a lot of space to relax, to appreciate, to notice details that we'd otherwise miss, and to not feel so frantic and panicked, which is going to give us allow us to then keep moving forward

in a healthier pace. I agree with the breath word indeed is a great method and just anything that we can find that for me that when I come back to truly to the present moment, which is just noticing it's happening around me in as great a detail as I can it, that is the best way I found to kind of come out of a very anxious or um driven state is to just kind of become present for a little bit of time. There there seems to be some peace there. It's challenging to stay there, but

there's certainly some peace there. Yeah, And I recommend to readers that when they're practicing this, it's going to be challenging, and that they don't need to do it, you know, all day, every day, and if they want to start with maybe doing you know, five minutes of breath word indeed practice when they notice themselves rushing, and then they can kind of let it go for a while and

come back to it. And it's like anything else, that's something that we're that that that should become ideally a daily practice, but but something that doesn't drive us nuts, you know, um. And it's something that ultimately will become a tool that we can turn to when we feel that heightened state of anxiety. You've got several other approaches. Let's maybe hit one or two of them before we wrap up, right, So slowing down as a key step.

Another key step is giving thanks, which, hey, if we're coming on to Turkey day, how to mention that one? So giving thanks is essential because one of the things that happens to us ambition attics is that we are constantly feeling disappointed because again, you know, our any day now is so grandiose, so we're never going to get there, or even if we get there, we realize that it's not even the endpoint we want. Even more so because

of that, we're so disappointed. The practice of giving thanks of creating a gratitude practice, and I walk through in the book how readers can actually create their own gratitude practice that respects their own background in terms of religion, spirituality, secularity, um style. You know, help folks put it together authentically for themselves. But what this does when we give thanks.

We again are appreciating the present moment, and we're also declaring that this day now, not any day now, but this day now has a lot of blessing and a lot of enjoyment and is a wonderful place to be. And that's something that, uh, when ambition is really going crazy, we convince ourselves otherwise, but in fact, when we slow down and take a look around, we have lots to

be thankful for. Indeed we do. Let me ask you a question about gratitude because one of the things that I have experienced is there are times that the gratitude feels like going through the motions. Um, you know, I'm doing it every day and I list out things that I'm grateful for, and sometimes I really feel that. In other times I feel like I'm making a list or

how do you work to keep that fresh for yourself? Well, the first thing I think is that there is going to be at the beginning of feeling of going through the motions, and I don't think that should deter us so much. Part of this practice is starting to rewire our brains, you know, and and and so there is going to be some time as we're transitioning out of this any day now mindset to this day now appreciation.

They're gonna be times when we're like, ah, you know, I'm saying I'm thankful for my family, for my friends, for the roof over my head, you know, but by God, I just really wish I could I could have a million dollars to you know, and um, and that's you know, going to happen. And I actually think going through the motions is not the worst thing at the beginning, because again we're we're you know, we're trying to reverse this

momentum here. Eventually, though, what I really encourage and I talked through how to do this in the book, is is to create a gratitude practice that's very flexible, so that we have a certain way that we begin. Maybe we say, you know, thank you God for my life, or thank you Universe for being able to wake up this morning, and maybe we start the same way every day. But then we let it meander and we can actually start to notice things in the midst of our gratitude practice.

Maybe we just look around and say thank you for that beautiful painting on the wall, or thank you for this sunrise, or it starts to become a little more dynamic, organic, um and flexible as opposed to just a fixed liturgy that we're doing every single day. I think that can really help, and I and I do teach folks how

to start to make that happen for themselves. The other word that I like for a gratitude practice, and you just used it in one of the sentences there is appreciation is to not only think of like the things you traditionally think you're grateful for, like that I have a home, and I have a job, and you know, I have friends, and but what can I appreciate that's happening in the moment or happened in the moment, whether it be a delicious cup of coffee or a sunrise

or you know, it's And to me, appreciation seems like a another way to frame it in my mind that helps me to to look at it a little bit with a wider lens. Yeah. Absolutely, And it's okay for us to give thanks for very mundane things, you know, Like I mean, I found myself one time giving thanks for Judd Apatow movies, you know, because I was just like, God, that guy is good. And every time I see one of his films, I just like feel better. So I was like, you know what, I got this gratitude practice.

I'm gonna give thanks for Judd Apataw. So there we go, and you know, and the thing is like that's totally authentic and appropriate and it actually helps in terms of my feeling in my life what to be grateful for. And again it totally counteracts this idea that any day now is all is all there is, because you know, Judd Apataws, this is forty is right here right now. So you know, there you go, Jed shout out for you.

But like I really, I really think give thanks for whatever, you know, give thanks for for your favorite hockey team. If if that's something that you're thankful for, let it be a part of this practice. Yeah, various musicians make my list all the time. Calvin Hobbs has made many many appearances. Uh, you know Leonard Cohen who's recently passed. Is a is a common feature. Absolutely, So let's hit one more of the five steps that you think are yeah,

I think the other one pick yeah, thank you. I think I'd love to mention the step of donate time. So we've slowed down, we're giving thanks and uh we still have ambition, though we still have this drive, we still have these goals. And again that's not that they're there. It's wrong to have goals or ambition. But one of the things that happens with ambition addiction is that we tend to really sequester our time to focus it only or primarily on individuals that can get us ahead. Um

and I've certainly seen that in my own life. You know, when I'm in a writing project, I do not want my kids bothering me. I don't you know, even want to hear about my wife and her crazy stories from work or whatever it is. You know, I'm focused on my dreams. So one of the things that I recommend we have a practice of and and actually of charting down in a given day, who do we normally interact with? And are there people that we normally interact with from

whom we're withholding our time? So and that could even be a pet you know, I've got to I've got a puppy that's always wanting me to take her for a walk, and you know, when I'm in a big project, you know, try to try to just just have her get as far from me as as as as she can, and so whatever it is. When we practice donating time, we we chart where we're spending our time. Are there individuals who were ignoring or or not giving much time

at all too? And then we make a practice of step by step, maybe even if it's an extra five minutes the next day, donating our time to those individuals, maybe one or two of them, who can't get us ahead towards her any day now, but for whom we but but for who we we care about or we respect, or at least we feel deserves a little time and attention. It's a beautiful sentence to wrap up, and I think

I don't think I could say it much better. Although this whole conversation has been making me think of a Bertrand Russell quote because you talk about how serious and and focus the ambition at it can be. And it's a quote I love. Which is one of the symptoms of an approaching nervous breakdown is the belief that one's work is terribly important. That's so good, that's uh yeah, yeah, that's a good one. Thank you for sharing that with me. I haven't heard that. Yeah yeah, well, thank you so

much for taking the time to come on again. Thanks, you know, congratulations on another book in a you know, pretty quick turnaround. So, um, I'm an ambitious guy. We've we figured that out. Yeah, thanks, yeah, but thanks so much for having me too. It's been really, really lovely. We'll have links to the to the books and all that stuff in the show notes into your website. And yep, thanks again for coming on. I loved our first conversation.

I've really enjoyed this one also, And um, could you make a turkey sound for us on the way out. I've never asked a guest to do that before. Skip it. No, that's that's inappropriate. Yeah, how is that perfect? All right? That's being a good sport, all right, and thanks so much. Take care. You can learn more about Benjamin Shalva and this podcast at one you Feed dot Net slash Benjamin too. If what you just heard was helpful to you, please consider making a donation to the one you Feed podcast.

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